Carousel
by Firestar9mm
Summary: Please review, this one scares me!


Carousel  
  
I don't know what part of me this came from, but it made me shiver.  
  
******  
  
There were two memories that circled endlessly in her head, like some lonely, empty carousel that knew not of the laughter of children. She guarded these memories jealously, ferociously, like a she-wolf protecting its den.  
  
These were the bright spots in a mind shadowed by cobwebs and haze; these were the painted horses in a darkened carnival, prancing endlessly to some maudlin midnight music that only they could hear.  
  
One of these memories she was unsure even belonged to her. It just surfaced enough in her fogged brain not to be ignored; she had claimed it as her own and in trying so hard to hold it tightly, every time it slipped further through her fingers.  
  
The memory made her a child again, and in it the sun shone brightly. She could feel it on her back, between her shoulder blades. It pressed.  
  
In one chubby hand she held a spray bottle, its purpose unknown. What it was for mattered not. What it revealed was so important.  
  
She could feel her hand tighten on the bottle, pull the trigger to release a shower of water, and her eyes widened all around so that the lashes touched the skin when she saw the magic that created.  
  
The sun beat down on that tiny rain, the way it beat across her bright hair, and made a rainbow. For a second she saw it, glittering, perfect, in the air, then it fell.  
  
Was it a miracle? Could it be repeated?  
  
Chubby hands, both this time in a teacup grip, pulled the trigger again. And again the magic bespelled her, shimmered for a second before her young eyes, only to fade.  
  
Helplessly, she reached out to take the rainbow, hold the color, only to be left alone with a slightly damp hand.   
  
That was where it ended. The rainbow was like memory itself-it was there or it was not. She could not hold it. She could not keep it.  
  
She shrugged her shoulders. She could not feel the sunlight there anymore, just the stretch of tortured flesh, slashed across where two wings might have been.  
  
The second memory was the one time she'd ever seen him smile...  
  
"I'm trapped alone with a beautiful woman, and she won't even throw herself into my arms and beg me to save her!" he'd said in a melodramatic voice. What a ham. She'd wanted to laugh, and ask him if she was supposed to say, "You villain, I'll foil you yet!" or some other ridiculous line.  
  
But she did no such thing, because that desire had been quickly slain by another, so fast and so strong that it had made her blood beat against her skin as if wanting to escape it.  
  
She HAD wanted to throw herself into his arms and beg him to save her-from Rosewater, from Paradigm, from herself. From all the inner demons that dogged her weary feet as she traipsed the streets of the city in her expensive shoes. The clicking of the heels seemed deafening. They were following the sound, waiting, waiting to take her to hell. To someplace worse.  
  
Did angels go to hell? Of course; they must. If there was such a thing as a devil-some scrap of some book somewhere-hadn't that devil...  
  
...once been an angel?  
  
What was the most frightening thing about it? That she had wanted to throw herself into his arms and beg him to save her?  
  
No. The most frightening part was that for a second, she had believed that he could.  
  
Anger twisted her pretty features. "You cannot do it!"  
  
"Please don't!" the man begged. Who was he? Who cared.  
  
Did all the angels become devils eventually?   
  
(A spray bottle. What for? What was it half-full of? She raised it up high, to the sun, the better to see it with...)  
  
She raised the gun. So nice, so small, a perfect fit in her small hands.   
  
(The miracle, she could hardly believe it! See it again-I must see it again!)  
  
"You cannot do it, Roger Smith," she murmured softly, to a victim with no name, a man who knew nothing of the negotiator, who looked on in confusion. It would be his last emotion.  
  
(Chubby hands tightening on the spray bottle's trigger, hardly daring to hope...)  
  
"You cannot save me from myself!"  
  
(A flash of sunlight, and there it was.)  
  
She'd pulled the trigger, but wait...there was no rainbow. There was only one color. Red. Red staining on the white...  
  
(Gone. It was gone. What was gone?...)  
  
The man was babbling something, someone's name, interrupted by wheezing. Death rattle. Poor devil. He was dead now. All right.  
  
She walked aimlessly down some deserted street, heels clicking. She hummed softly to herself, maudlin little music for an empty carousel. She could almost see herself reaching for a memory, reaching for that brass ring...  
  
"Do you think maybe living is not caring about appearances?" Roger Smith asked her. The smile had been beautiful, because they'd SHARED it. Something warm had been in his eyes.  
  
But that was the second memory. The first was...  
  
...was...  
  
What was that? There'd been another a second ago, but now...  
  
In the cone of light from a streetlamp on the deserted avenue, the fallen angel held tightly to her last memory and waited.  
  
******  
  
Part of me wants to giggle, but part of me is scared. Please review! I've never tried to write an Angel fic before. I think waking Roger up on time would be easier!  



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